Nuns on the Bus will ride again after Ryan selection

by Maureen Fiedler

NCR Today

By picking Paul Ryan as his choice for vice president, Mitt Romney might have thought the two would run against the Obama-Biden ticket. Well, yes; but not just them. Like it or not, they are also running against the Nuns on the Bus.

If I were Romney and Ryan, I think I'd be more worried about the latter. Nuns on the Bus was, after all, organized to highlight the gross injustices in the Ryan Budget, voted out favorably by the Republican-dominated House of Representatives. Now that Ryan is on the ticket, I suspect this bus tour will continue in some form.

The women at NETWORK, which sponsored the tour, are already thinking about what they might do next to highlight what they regard as the immorality of the Ryan budget. And they definitely get points for creative ideas.

Sr. Simone Campbell, executive director of NETWORK, is already a favorite guest on evening cable talk shows. At a time when nuns have a favorability rating that most public figures can only dream about, that counts.

For the record, the Ryan Budget would turn Medicare into the voucher program, cut Medicaid and other important programs like food stamps, Pell grants, infrastructure spending and various types of aid for the poor and vulnerable. Meanwhile, it offers large new tax breaks for the very wealthy.

The Nuns on the Bus tour denounced that budget as immoral. In doing so, they were echoing the Catholic bishops, who have also denounced that budget. But when it comes to media, it's the nuns that count these days. Someone tell Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, will you?